


Before you were looking for Batman

by yue_ix



Category: Batman Beyond
Genre: 1990 fashion choices, 1990 slang, Alternate Universe - 1990s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack, Gen, POV Outsider, Time Travel, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-24
Updated: 2019-05-24
Packaged: 2020-03-13 10:43:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18939319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yue_ix/pseuds/yue_ix
Summary: John "Jo" Johnson is, in turn, a rising star artist, a poet, a handsome young man first on the scene of natural disaster, a fashion critique, and a stalker, but that's before he accidentally works for the mob. And all of that is before he becomes the true hero Gotham needed all along.





	Before you were looking for Batman

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [This is not the bat you're looking for. [podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12184122) by [litrapod (litra)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/litra/pseuds/litrapod). 



> Written for [remixapod 2019](https://remixapod.dreamwidth.org/), as a remix of Litra's excellent aural not!fic [This is not the bat you're looking for](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12184122). It isn't a required listening but would explain what is going on much better than Jo can. Also, it is an incredibly fun story. You should listen to it, because it's great.
> 
> Huge thanks to Opalsong for letting me tweet!fic this at her for days, and FumblesMcStupid for the beta.

"John "Jo" Johnson is a rising star artist", Jo thinks to himself. 

The weather is still too cold for his thin tricolour jacket, but it's the one that makes him look the coolest, and you never know when an agent might be scouting. He is close to graduating with a degree in from graphic arts, not acting, but he wouldn't say no to money from any field. That's the kind of guy Jo is: multi-talented and open-minded. 

"Jo's extraordinary eye for the unique in the mundane sets him apart from all his peers." Jo continues, casting himself as his own reviewer. He can't wait to be truly interviewed, once his talents are recognized. His answers are all ready. 

First step is to get featured in a gallery, or published in a big name magazine. Or anywhere, really. Newspapers. School papers. Jo is humble; all artists started low and worked their way up.

Shivering at the cold nipping his spine, he paints a perfectly even layer of wheat-paste glue on the wall in front of him and carefully positions a new movie poster on top of the previous ones, making sure the corners align. 

This part of town is dilapidated and unsafe. Jo's current employer only sends teams of two people to flypost. However, Jo's colleague finished gluing her own posters half an hour ago and kept whining about Jo being too slow. 

"Not everyone can be a fast slob", Jo snapped. "Some People only produce quality work". 

She huffed and left him here, all alone. Unbelievable. 

Jo admires the poster he just adhered to this old building facade, for the movie _The Rocketeer_. The art is pretty cool. Someday, it'll be him doing that. He just knows it. 

He carefully rolls his painter staff into the wheat-paste once more, and then jumps a foot in the air when loud _CRASH_ , **BAM** and SPLAT noises interrupt his concentration. Glue flies everywhere. 

It feels like an earthquake. The ground shakes, the old building down the streets creaks ominously. Under Jo's very eyes, it collapses in on itself like the legs of an elephant who finally reached the Elephant Graveyard, or perhaps as a metaphor for the corruption the city's crumbling under. See? Jo is _such_ a good poet. 

Within a few minutes, it's all over. Jo coughs and wipes his face as the dust settles and the last of the debris tumble down. Distant cries can be heard through the mostly deserted neighborhood. Jo hopes no one was squatting that building.

In the settling silence, Jo hears it: someone else is coughing, and it seems to come from the wreck! Jo gets excited. He loves it when he's right.

He steps carefully towards the noise, drawn by morbid fascination and his ungrateful taste for thrill-seeking.

"Local artist finds and rescues trapped child", the headlines will say. Or maybe: "Handsome young man first on the scene of natural disaster".

He navigates around large fallen blocks, following the curses he can hear clearly and editing his headlines as they escalate in filth. He's reached "Wonderful local artist discover homeless ex-sailor in rubble" when he sees the source of the noise.

A svelte figure is getting to their feet and poking at their own arms, muttering to themselves. They are wearing a skin-tight, full-body black outfit with red accents and very long ears. Jo has never seen anything like it. Maybe the person was heading to a specialty Club of some sort? 

Jo hides behind a large piece of concrete, looking at this weirdo. The fit of the costume means Jo is pretty damn certain there's a guy inside, with broad shoulders and the legs of a ballerina. It's a very strange combination, spooky and deadly, and Jo itches to sketch it. He stares discreetly, committing details to his excellent visual memory. Plus, maybe if he keeps very quiet, the guy won't see him, like when Jo sneaks in to see a movie. 

The scary guy pats himself all over (is he hurt? He doesn't act hurt) but then pokes insistently at his head and belt. Maybe he's a pervert? Or sick? Half of Gotham seems to be on the brink of a meltdown. 

Of course, since all Gifted individuals are also cursed, Jo gets noticed immediately by the guy. He JUMPS, legs folded under him with the grace of a panther, webbed arms outstretched, and leaps effortlessly over a dozen feet of rubble to land on soundless pointed feet right in front of Jo. Jo emits a perfectly natural and human-sounding shriek of surprise. The guy is _fast_ and so, so _fly_. 

"Give me your coat," he rasps. Jo gapes at him in confused wonder. 

"Huh. No?" He heroically resists, ignoring how "Beloved Aspiring Artist Attacked And Killed By Fetish Cat" flashes through his mind. 

The guy looms over Jo and extends a hand - that is, holy jelly ranger, clawed! - and grips Jo's jacket.

"It wasn't a request. Give. Me. Your. Coat."

Jo slips it off and hands it over with shaking hands.

The killer ballerina guy puts on the jacket right over what he's wearing, pulling the hood over his mask' ears. Their sharp edges instantly poke through the multi-colored nylon material. 

The pink patches and the leopard prints of the jacket clash with the strange black-and-red suit. Jo tells the odd man this, because Jo is a nice person who believes in honesty, yet the guy just snarls in reply and walks off without saying another word.

He's kind of rude, but Jo doesn't care. This is the Angel of Death Jo dreamed about in his late teens. He's allowed to be rude. 

The guy wanders into the street, looking around, and Jo decides to follow from a safe distance. At the intersection, the guy bends down and picks up a newspaper from the ground, turns it around a few times. Maybe he has a concussion? To Jo's discerning eye, he seemed to walk fine, but you never know. Or maybe he can't read? 

Eventually, the guy figures out the right way up, reads a little, then palms his face as if he has an headache. Jo can't blame him - the times are the most terrible they've ever been. Unemployment is through the roof, violence on the street higher than ever, and no budget is ever allotted to built that mental health center each successive mayor keeps promising. Jo is eager to go voting for the first time this year. 

Police sirens resonate through the street then, and Jo turns to see two police car make their way over. When he swirls back to the strange man, he discovers him...gone.

Jo sticks around to give his statement to the police, hoping at least a couple of reporters will appear and photograph his handsome face. Instead, no one else shows up and the policemen tell him to get out of there and forget about his jacket. Jo gets out of there. 

He doesn't forget about the Guy, though. Nor his jacket.

/\\../\ __..__ /\\../\ 

Between jobs and his last few classes, Jo spends the following evenings going back to that neighborhood. The Guy made camp nearby, or something. During his watch, Jo gets glimpses of him feeding stray dogs, dissembling electrical appliances, and trying to build new things with the parts.

Whatever the guy is attempting to do, it doesn't seem to go as planned because he keeps discarding his inventions or, excitingly, throwing them in the air and then jumping way high to drop-kick them into pieces. It is the best thing ever.

Oh yeah, the guy also practices some kind of fighting moves every single day, with humanly impossible force, grace and stamina. He is both the coolest person Jo has ever met and the scariest. It's as if RoboCop met Jane Fonda.

The fact that the guy is STILL wearing a full-body nylon costume AND Jo's wonderful baggy jacket at all times compounds this.

All these spying sessions get cut short, because the dude also has an uncanny ability to always know when Jo is there, and tells him to scamper off. Sometimes he throws things at Jo if Jo stays anyway. His aim is formidably accurate.

Every time, Jo is torn between being relieved to still be alive and being the most Inspired he's ever been in his life. This must be what having a muse is like. 

He needs a name for the Guy though, and the Guy refuses to remove his mask or tell Jo his name, no matter how many times Jo asks him (or yells at him, often while he's running away). He just says it starts with "B". 

Jo decides to call him The Balleteer, or only B, in the intimacy of his mind. He makes a few dozen sketches of B and tells his story to all his friends, but both of them just laugh at him. Alone at night, he stares at the drawings and smiles.

/\\../\ __..__ /\\../\ 

Sadly, like most of Jo's hobbies, this one doesn't pay. The newspapers also don't want to listen to his fantastic story _nor_ interview him as an upcoming artist. On top of this, the underground publicity company has fired him for, supposedly, spending all the time he was supposed to put up posters either staring at them or creeping on B.

Jo is glad he doesn't have to work there anymore; they clearly couldn't keep up with his talents. He still needs money for rent and food though, so he starts looking for something else.

He gets fired from two more jobs and is sharing his sorrows with pigeons on the docks when he sees it: a small, discreet ad taped to a rusted railway.

> "Strong men with good eyes needed for a night shift job."

Jo is as strong as he is handsome, and through the years many people told him he has beautiful eyes. What's more, as is the case with most True Artists, Jo likes to get up very late and stays up even later. He is perfect for this job!

He calls the given number, and they ask him a lot of very weird questions. He hums and errs through most of his answers, until the person says, "Look. Honestly this job is tomorrow and we're short a couple men. There's been strange attacks on our gang lately. Can you see? Like, are you blind?"

"Erm, no?"

"Good enough. We pay 6$ per hour cash at the end of the job if it goes well. If during that time you see something, you tell us. Outside of that time, you keep your mouth shut. Capish?"

"Sure." Jo said, and just like that, he has a job. Sweet!

/\\../\ __..__ /\\../\ 

Jo shows up at the time and place (well, give or take an hour) and diligently starts working right away. Midnight comes and pass, and the polluted waters sparkle under the full moon. For the first couple of hours, Jo sees a lot of seagulls and a few boats, but when he relays these via the provided walkie-talkie, his employer and fellow employees tell him to shut up and to watch the docks, not the sea.

Jo doesn't understand - nothing is happening on that side, whereas water is always a source of inspiration. He sighs. No one ever understands him.

Jo is composing a delightful poem to capture the sinking beauty of the harbor when he hears a commotion behind him. He turns around just in time to see none other than his very own muse, here on the docks! The Balleteer is creeping along the edges of the docks, right where Jo is supposed to watch out for something. The boss said to radio in if he saw anything unusual, and Jo wonders if The Balleteer counts as "unusual". On one hand, Jo sees him every single day. On the other hand, most people don't have a personal muse like he does and might also find him dope, right? 

Jo presses the button. "Woah, check this out - "

Someone else clicks on. "For the love of God, Jo, we don't care how pretty the moon is!" 

Jo frowns down at his walkie-talkie. What _evers_. Talk to the hand!

When Jo looks up, B's gone. Oh no. Jo looks around and -- there! A huge puff of pale grey smoke emanates from the south pier. Every now and then, people are thrown outwards from the cloud, bewildered and battered. Inside, there's flashes of something dark moving with deadly speed that is all too familiar. 

Jo gets closer and closer to the melee and recognizes one of his new colleagues, Rick, when he's flung into Jo's arms. Jo stumbles under his weight and yells over the commotion. 

"Hey, what's going on?"

"Jo? I don't know! A kid was found spying on the Big Boss' transaction, and now there's all this smoke and _something_ is kicking our asses one by one!" 

"Oh!" Jo brightens up. "That one would be The Balleteer!"

"What? You've ran into this beast before?"

"Oh yeah. He's very strong, and very, very fast. He wears black and get this: he - can - fly. I've seen him throw a car battery in the air and drop-kick it into the next street, like an action movie! He once stole my jacket." Jo can't help but add, dreamily. 

The smoke around them swirls up from the sea winds drafts, revealing glimpses of The Balleteer fighting a bunch of people at once. He's flipping and dancing around their blows in his usual graceful fashion. In context of a real fight, it looks even more amazeballs than watching him practice the moves alone. 

Rick picks himself up. "If he's just a guy, I can take him." Before Jo can argue, Rick throws himself back into the smoke, fist first - 

\- and is promptly kicked back out. Jo sidesteps this time, letting Rick sprawl on the floor. 

Jo is pondering helping him get up when a shadow merges out of the smoke. B's black and red pointy suit is immaculate, Jo's jacket is hanging in torn shreds around him like neon cobwebs (awww, shucks!), the sharp eyes of his mask glow bone white. He spreads his arms, armpit wings blood-red, claws out, and in that moment he radiates pure gothic minimalism and murder. He growls at Rick: "I am Batman. I am your worst nightmare". 

Jo bites his lips and clenched his fists. He wants to tell B his own nickname for him is way better, but he also wants to draw this moment _SO BAD_. Rick yells in terror and scrambles backwards before scampering off. 

The Balleteer (or, ugh, Batman?) swirls towards Jo. "You." He accuses. "What the hell, Jo?" 

Jo waves, touched that B knows his name. "Hi. You still have my jacket. What's left of it, anyway," he mumbles. 

B shakes his head and jabs his sharp talon in the opposite direction of the docks. "Go. Away." 

Then B steps back into the smoke. Only the tips of his mask are still visible when he adds as an afterthought. "And call the police!" 

Jo whispers back, "count on me, B" and jogs towards the city looking for a pay phone. Behind him, he can hear amplified sounds of fighting, and even guns going off. Woah! 

Jo calls the police and hurries back home to create dozens of new sketches of B, whistling. He was right all along. Jo is a true hero.

/\\../\ __..__ /\\../\ 

Jo shows up the next day at the given time and place and ends up only getting paid a third what they promised him, since the job technically did end up alright, even if "interference showed up". Afterward, several of the guys - most of them beaten up to some extent - are trading smokes and sharing stories, complaining about weirdos and the cops showing up. Rick hails Jo as he's trying to sneak past them.

"Hey, Jo! You said you've ran into that guy before, right? The smoke demon? What can you tell us about him?" 

Suddenly, all eyes are on him. Jo straightens to his full height. "Not much." They all deflate. Jo cannot let this perfect opportunity to shine pass him by. He lifts the heavy drawing pad he had brought along today, to draw the boats. "But I have sketches of him?" 

And that is how Jo ends up showing off his last weeks of works to a gallery of deeply interested people. Many point out which move was used to cause which of their injuries. Several of them even pay for some of his sketches, either for insurance purposes, to scare other people, or for boasting, Jo can't tell. In any case, he ends up making twice his pay. 

This gives him a brilliant idea: Jo will make a comic strip with the adventures of Batman. 

It is an instant hit with the whole " "night shift" " crew, who he kept in touch with, and also a lot of very strange people who dress funny and talk sinister. Maybe there's a whole underground of people like B who now feel represented? Either way, Jo is getting some good exposure in bars and the docks flyers. Shady characters keep asking him to make 'WANTED' posters featuring B's best angles. 

Jo feels a bit weird about that at first, but, like, he completely understands how anyone else could want to learn more about The Batman, and also, it's not like anyone can even find B anymore. Since that fight, B hasn't shown up in any of his previous haunts. Jo misses him a lot. Doing these sketches is what allows him to grieve their special and unique bond, trace a path towards healing with each new ink stroke. 

It's not a lot of money, but it's better than nothing. 

And then, a few weeks later, a bit after every single newspaper explodes under the weight of some new Wayne Mystery Uncovered, The Balleteer - no, The Batman! - starts to show up _everywhere_ in Gotham and cleans the streets of thugs and villains. He sadly continues to call himself Batman - which thwarts Jo's hopes of getting him to seriously consider The Balleteer instead - but is just as trippin' awesome as ever. And, most importantly, no one can get a clear picture of him. 

Jo's artist renditions are now worth their weight in gold. Within a month, his comics become a weekly feature in **The Gotham Gazette**. He gets interviewed (once, and only as a speculative fiction artist, but it totally counts). 

Jo is nothing if not humble and noble. Despite fame and money, he remembers his roots. When clouds blanket the sky and the 'bat signal' shines in the sky like a second moon, Jo likes to step out onto his fire exit for a smoke and waves hi to it. 

One night, as he's doing this, a nearby shadow waves back. Jo's heart about stops yet he gets it together enough to yell "You still have my jacket!". The shadow chuckles and leaps off the roof. 

A day later, Jo finds a brand new jacket hanging to his fire escape. 

  /\\../\  
  
          __..__  
  
               /\\../\

The end.

**Author's Note:**

> Litra's aural not!fic has Terry accidentally go back in time to 1990. It has a strong, solid plot line and great dialogue lines that I can't complement not expend. But there was also this recurring OC, Joe, that I loved. After attempting to write him 4 different ways in twice that many weeks, I went to Opalsong to whine that I didn't 'connect with his character'. She asked me what I wanted to write, not what worked best. And this is what I wanted to write. 
> 
> (For the record, my second favourite character was Alfred, who absolutely spiked the tea and Has Regrets about accidentally adopting this young man enabling bb!Bruce's danger seeking and teaching him how to fight.)


End file.
